Smoky likes to cuddle too

Smoky says:

I felt bad when Fay wrote about Sabrina having  the “cuddles” a few days ago and I wanted all of you to know that I am very cuddly too. I sprawl out in Bob’s lap as soon as he sits down and will lay there for hours.  If Bob isn’t around I am in Fay’s lap. When she puts the big soft furry blanket in her lap I knead it for a long time. I like to use my head to bump you and get attention. That’s how I wake Fay up in the morning. This morning she was laying on her tummy so I laid on her back and gave here a massage on her shoulders with my paws.  I kind of let my claws out too much because she said OUCH!

Fay says I am the sweetest big guy and am so gentle. I never say anything, just purr real loud. I don’t seem quite as cuddly as Sabrina because I am twice as big as she is so I am a pretty big two arms of cat where Sabrina is just a little pile of fur. At first I didn’t like to sit still very long when Fay would pick me up to hold me in her arms but now I like it a lot and will let her snuggle me in her arms for quite awhile.

Here is a picture of me sleeping on Bob.  You can see my two favorite soft blankets beside the chair.  We are sitting in the massage chair.

Here is me and one of my two favorite blankets.  This one is now in the office on the floor by Fay’s desk.   I go in at least twice a day and knead on it.

I’m really like the soft blanket when it is on your lap and after I get to know you I will come sit on your lap if you come to visit.  My tummy is really soft and Fay still calls it my “jelly belly” and I like to have it rubbed.   Sabrina likes her tummy rubbed too.  Just call me Smoky the big cuddle cat.

Fay says because I am a bigger kitty than Sabrina so I get more pictures of myself on the blog than Sabrina does.

I am very cuddly when Fay and Bob work in the office and I spread out over their little desk.   I sleep on their papers and put my head and paws on the keyboard of Bob’s laptop.  Sometimes I like to sleep by the window.   I don’t think they mind because they both pet me, scratch my neck and rub my tummy.   We have such a nice life together.

This is my favorite pose.

Our latest wood creation – Can you guess what it is?

Do you know what this is?  Scroll down.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ok, how about when you see it in use?

This is our favorite new thing to make.

Dogs reunited with their military owners

This short video really touched me.   Get your tissues out.   I know many of my readers are dog lovers so I think you will be glad you watched this.   Wonder what happens when these soldiers have cats and they come home?

http://homepost.kpbs.org/2011/12/dogs-reunite-with-their-military-owners-video/

Sabrina has a case of the “cuddles”

Sabrina says:

I don’t know what has gotten into me today.   I just want to be by Fay every minute and sit in her lap and lick her fingers and nose.  As soon as she sits down I jump in her lap and let her cuddle me and pet me and scratch my neck.  I’m usually more independent than this but not today.    I was sitting stretched out on her legs and I used my tail to stroke her arm.   She really liked that.   I don’t know if I have ever pet anyone with my tail before.  I don’t think Fay minds at all because she sure has paid a lot of attention to me today.

Fay is on the computer now and I am sitting right in front of her on the desk so she can pet me.   I purr so loud and sit quiet and don’t knock anything off the desk.   Well, maybe I get into a little mischief if she doesn’t pay enough attention to me.  If I stand in front of her monitor I can usually get her attention.  I don’t have to stand there too long before she stops what she is doing and picks me up in her arms and snuggles me.   I have a soft little blanket right by her desk and sometimes it is good enough to just sleep there but not today.  Today I just want to be held, snuggled, petted and cuddled.

Don’t you just want to cuddle me too?

Remembering Christmas 2011

We spent Christmas Eve and Christmas day with friends in Mt. Pleasant which is just outside of Charleston.  We were surprised at the lack of traffic both on the way down and home.  It is a very easy 4 hour drive.   I brought most of the dinner Christmas Eve which was a menu that worked around Swedish meatballs and noodles.  I really miss the Swedish meatball mix I used to get from Schmidts Meat Market in Nicollet.   Mine were ok but not as good as I used to make.  Lynn and Bob had neighbors we had not met before over for dinner and then we went to church.  Lynn and Bob both sing in the choir so that is always nice. Weather was above 60 both days.

Christmas morning we opened our presents and then started on dinner.  Bob had planned a menu of prime rib, a delicious salad, Yourshire pudding, fresh brussel sprouts, roastede vegetables and mashed potatoes with Jersulum artichokes.  It was a very ambitious menu to make and I had fun working in the kitchen.  I was the helper and not responsibel so no stress for me.  Dinner was delicious.  Lola and Glen, who we have met many times, were there along with a new gentleman and his 18 year old son.   Lots of goood conversation, perhaps helped by a few bottles of wine for some of us. 

After everyone left we watched the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the St. Olaf Choir on TV.   Since both Lynn and Bob sing in choirs they gave us some new insight to what we were watching.  On Monday before we left we went with Lynn and Bob for a long walk on a new pier into the Shim Creek.   A delightful way to end our visit and get a little exercise before our drive home. 

Bob and I  kept our gift giving very small.  We talked at length about getting an I Pad and decided for the money it cost we just would not use it that much.  I came up with something I really wanted and Bob did too.   I told him I wanted our cleaning lady back once a month.   Now you can laugh.  Currently we share the house cleaning – Bob vacumes and I do the floors, sinks and dusting, etc.  Even though we have lots of time  cleaning is something we don’t like doing.  This will be such a treat to have again!  I told our neighbor Tammy, our cleaning lady, that she was a gift and she said she would come gift wrapped with a bow when she comes.   Unfortunately she got bronchitis, pneumonia and the flu so I don’t know when she will be well enough to come.   I hope before we have company next week.

Kitties were glad to have us come home.  Hope you had as good a holiday as we did.  Nothing special planned for New Years except a nice dinner at home and we will probably be in bed by 11.  Looking forward to doing some woodworking and other craft activities.

Merry Christmas from the Chobans

Smoky and Sabrina wanted to help in sending out our holiday greeting to all of you.  This is a very special time of year and we hope all our family and friends are enjoying the season with their loved ones.

Sabrina and Smoky say:
We don’t have that big tree with all the balls this year so we had to find other things to play with.  Fay had a wreath propped up against the wall and somehow it fell down.   Smoky really likes it but didn’t hurt it.

When we were kittens last year Fay gave us catnip but we didn’t like it.  Now that we are older we really like it.  Sabrina especially likes to roll around in it and stretch out and scoot herself across the carpet. We also got some catnip pellets which make much less mess but so far we don’t like those so much.

Fay and Bob have chairs at the table and when they sit there they eat food.   We figured if we sat on the stools too we would get food.  Sometimes it works and we get little cat treats but we rarely get human food, even though Sabrina begs REALLY hard.

We like to play outside all day long.  Often we don’t get much farther than the deck but we still like it.   There aren’t so many bugs to chase now but we have fun with leaves.  Fay and Bob are worried about us because there are some new neighbors renting just a couple houses down from us and they have young teenagers who are walking around with bb rifle guns and there have been some problems in the neighborhood.  They want us home before school gets out.

Sabrina got something new that she really likes playing in.

Merry Christmas to all of you.

Smoky, Sabrina, Fay and Bob.

More wood creations

Our workshop continues to be busy.   Bob and I took a class at the Guild on making bandsaw boxes.   Even though we have some past experience we really learned a lot in the two evenings and are very glad we took the course.  Bob also made a box like the large center one.  Fay made the one with the different shape on the left and Bob made the square one on the right.   These are maple or spalted maple. The center box is about 8″ by 5″.

I have been practicing with my scroll saw and was trying to find something to do with my practice pieces.   They are just out of poplar so don’t really have a pretty finish so I decided to use up some of my paints and stickers.

These are at most 4″ high.   The cat has red eyes and a little red dot on it’s nose.  I also did three round Christmas ornaments with cute 3 dimensional stickers on them. The butterfly is by far the hardest thing I have done.   The first one didn’t turn out great but this is my second one and I am pretty pleased with it.   Those little antenna were tough to make.   Next I will try some cutting on better wood.

Our pens keep going out the door as fast as we make them. Some of the ones from our exotic wood are really breathtaking.   I did one from striped ebony that is gorgeous.  We have a new tilted wine bottle holder that is really fun and we gave many out as gifts.   The finish is still drying on the remaining ones so no photo yet.  We have also given quite a few of our boxes as gifts and people seem to like them.

On the downside I found out recently that if I don’t have an apron on and am sanding and get the sanding dust in my jeans and t shirt I start to itch, a lot.  I dug out the benadryl and itch cream last night.   The wood I was working with mostly was mahogany and also a little walnut.   I know walnut is a wood many have a reaction to.  No rash or redness just itching.  I will definitely have to be more careful.

Signs of a heart attack in women

I thought this was important and worth sharing.   Let’s hope we never need to know this information.

NURSE’S HEART ATTACK describes what women feel when having one! Please read Ladies and husbands

NURSE’S HEART ATTACK EXPERIENCE
I am an ER nurse and this is the best description of this event that I have ever heard.
Please read, pay attention, and send it on!

FEMALE HEART ATTACKS
I was aware that female heart attacks are different, but this is the best description I’ve ever read.

Women and heart attacks (Myocardial infarction)..  Did you know that women rarely have the same dramatic symptoms that men have when experiencing heart attack..  you know, the sudden stabbing pain in the chest, the cold sweat, grabbing the chest & dropping to the floor that we see in the movies.  Here is the story of one woman’s experience with a heart attack.

‘I had a heart attack at about 10:30 PM with NO prior exertion, NO prior emotional trauma that one would suspect might have brought it on.  I was sitting all snugly & warm on a cold evening, with my purring cat in my lap, reading an interesting story my friend had sent me, and actually thinking, ‘A-A-h, this is the life, all cozy and warm in my soft, cushy Lazy Boy with my feet propped up.

A moment later, I felt that awful sensation of indigestion, when
you’ve been in a hurry and grabbed a bite of sandwich and washed it down with a dash of water, and that hurried bite seems to feel like you’ve swallowed a golf ball going down the esophagus in slow motion and it is most uncomfortable.  You realize you shouldn’t have gulped it down so fast and needed to chew it more thoroughly and this time drink a glass of water to hasten its progress down to the stomach.

This was my initial sensation–the only trouble was that I hadn’t
taken a bite of anything since about 5:00 p.m.

After it seemed to subside, the next sensation was like little
squeezing motions that seemed to be racing up my SPINE (hind-sight, it was probably my aorta spasms), gaining speed as they continued racing up and under my sternum (breast bone, where one presses rhythmically when administering CPR).

This fascinating process continued on into my throat and branched out into both jaws.  ’AHA!!  NOW I stopped puzzling about what was happening — we all have read and/or heard about pain in the jaws being one of the signals of an MI happening, haven’t we?  I said aloud to myself and the cat, Dear God, I think I’m having a heart attack!

I lowered the foot rest dumping the cat from my lap, started to take a step and fell on the floor instead.  I thought to myself, If this is a heart attack, I shouldn’t be walking into the next room where the phone is or anywhere else…  but, on the other hand, if I don’t, nobody will know that I need help, and if I wait any longer I may not be able to get up in a moment.

I pulled myself up with the arms of the chair, walked slowly into the next room and dialed the Paramedics…  I told her I thought I was having a heart attack due to the pressure building under the sternum and radiating into my jaws.  I didn’t feel hysterical or afraid, just stating the facts.  She said she was sending the Paramedics over immediately, asked if the front door was near to me, and if so, to un-bolt the door and then lie down on the floor ( I was told never to lay down…but sit up in a chair..F ) where they could see me when they came in.

I unlocked the door and then laid down on the floor as instructed and lost consciousness, as I don’t remember the medics coming in, their examination, lifting me onto a gurney or getting me into their ambulance, or hearing the call they made to St. Jude ER on the way, but I did briefly awaken when we arrived and saw that the radiologist was already there in his surgical blues and cap, helping the medics pull my stretcher out of the ambulance.  He was bending over me asking
questions (probably something like ‘Have you taken any medications?’) but I couldn’t make my mind interpret what he was saying, or form an answer, and nodded off again, not waking up until the Cardiologist and partner had already threaded the teeny angiogram balloon up my femoral artery into the aorta and into my heart where they installed 2 side by side stints to hold open my right coronary artery.

I know it sounds like all my thinking and actions at home must have taken at least 20-30 minutes before calling the paramedics, but actually it took perhaps 4-5 minutes before the call, and both the fire station and St Jude are only minutes away from my home, and my Cardiologist was already to go to the OR in his scrubs and get going on restarting my heart (which had stopped somewhere between my arrival and the procedure) and installing the stints. Why have I written all of this to you with so much detail? Because I want all of you who are so important in my life to know what I learned first hand.

1.  Be aware that something very different is happening in your body, not the usual men’s symptoms but inexplicable things happening (until my sternum and jaws got into the act).  It is said that many more women than men die of their first (and last) MI because they didn’t know they were having one and commonly mistake it as indigestion, take some Maalox or other anti-heartburn preparation and go to bed, hoping they’ll feel better in the morning when they wake up… which doesn’t happen.  My female friends, your symptoms might not be exactly like mine, so I advise you to call the Paramedics if ANYTHING is unpleasantly happening that you’ve not felt before.  It is better to have a ‘false alarm’ visitation than to risk your life guessing what it might be!

2.  Note that I said ‘Call the Paramedics.’  And if you can take an aspirin.  Ladies, TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE!

Do NOT try to drive yourself to the ER – you are a hazard to others on the road.

Do NOT have your panicked husband who will be speeding and looking anxiously at what’s happening with you instead of the road.

Do NOT call your doctor — he doesn’t know where you live and if it’s at night you won’t reach him anyway, and if it’s daytime, his assistants (or answering service) will tell you to call the Paramedics.  He doesn’t carry the equipment in his car that you need to be saved!  The Paramedics do, principally OXYGEN that you need ASAP.  Your Dr will be notified later.

3.  Don’t assume it couldn’t be a heart attack because you have a normal cholesterol count.  Research has discovered that a cholesterol elevated reading is rarely the cause of an MI (unless it’s unbelievably high and/or accompanied by high blood pressure).  MIs are usually caused by long-term stress and inflammation in the body, which dumps all sorts of deadly hormones into your system to sludge things up in there.  Pain in the jaw can wake you from a sound sleep.  Let’s be careful and be aware.  The more we know the better chance we could survive.

A cardiologist says if everyone who gets this mail sends it to 10 people, you can be sure that we’ll save   at least one life.

*Please be a true friend and send this article to all your friends (male & female) who you care about!*

The Twelve Days of Christmas

“The 12 Days of Christmas” are from Christmas Eve, December 24th through January 6th, the Eastern Orthodox Christmas.  Thanks for this cousin Larry.

There is one Christmas Carol that has always baffled me. What in the world do leaping lords, French hens, swimming swans, and especially the partridge who won’t come out of the pear tree have to do with Christmas?

This week, I found out.

From 1558 until 1829, Roman Catholics in England were not permitted to practice their faith openly. Someone during that era wrote this carol as a catechism song for young Catholics. It has two levels of meaning: the surface meaning plus a hidden meaning known only to members of their church. Each element in the carol has a code word for a religious reality which the children could remember.

-The partridge in a pear tree was Jesus Christ.

-Two turtle doves were the Old and New Testaments.

-Three French hens stood for faith, hope and love.-

-The four calling birds were the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke &John.

-The five golden rings recalled the Torah or Law, the first five books of the Old Testament.

-The six geese a-laying stood for the six days of creation.

-Seven swans a-swimming represented the sevenfold gifts of the Holy Spirit–Prophesy, Serving, Teaching, Exhortation, Contribution, Leadership, and Mercy.

-The eight maids a-milking were the eight beatitudes.

-Nine ladies dancing were the nine fruits of the Holy Spirit–Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, and Self Control.

-The ten lords a-leaping were the ten commandments.

-The eleven pipers piping stood for the eleven faithful disciples.

-The twelve drummers drumming symbolized the twelve points of belief in the Apostles’ Creed.

So there is your history for today. This knowledge was shared with me and I found it interesting and enlightening and now I know how that strange song became a Christmas Carol…so pass it on if you wish.’

More “outside the box” creations

We have been very busy making more creations and are very pleased with how these turned out.

This photo shows on the left a box we made earlier and the same box on the right once we had more practice.   These are part of a group I made called  my “baby boxes”.  They are about 4″ by 4″.  The one on the right is oak and mahogany and now has a cute little hand made mahogany pull handle like the one on the left.

This is another small box also oak and mahogany.

And this is my favorite small one.  I like the lines on this.

While I was making my little boxes Bob worked on two large ones.  This is about 9 inches long and is called biped.   It is mahogany with birch handles.

Our favorite one is mahogany with birch drawer fronts and mahogany handles.   It really turned out nice.

Bob cut out the two big ones and I cut out the little ones and I did most of the sanding and finishing on all of them and we both flocked the insides.   The finish is 3 coats of Watco natural oil followed by a spray coat of shellac followed by three – four thin coats of spray lacquer.

Hope you enjoyed our work.